The Catholic Leader - 12 November - Issue 5477

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The Catholic Leader, November 12, 2017
Sony Foundation Children’s
Holiday Camp
YEARS 7-12 | ALL GIRLS | DAY & BOARDING |
World Challenge
Mercy Works
Community Service Program
Mercy Girls in Action
Years
Celebrating
save the date
CENTENARY CELEBRATION WEEKEND
4-6 MAY 2018
A genius idea that will
knock your socks off
Creative idea: Twelve-
year-old Olivia Cog-
netta has come up
with an idea to turn
odd socks into soap
and washers.
WE all have the potential to generate “genius” to
share with the world.
However we don’t always have the time.
What would you do with an hour dedicated to investigating and
exploring something in which you are interested?
At Mt Alvernia College, Kedron, students participate in Ge-
nius Hour where they are challenged to come up with an idea to
focus on.
Genius Hour is a global movement, which aims to foster crea-
tivity and innovation in the classroom.
When 12-year-old Olivia Cognetta submitted her idea during
Genius Hour at her school she had no idea how far it would go.
“Our teacher told us to choose an idea, and Mum and I were
brainstorming and I thought we could help the homeless,” she
said.
With a win-win strategy to re-purpose those odd socks everyone
finds at the bottom of the washing basket, the young inventor is
collecting socks and soap for the homeless, so she can sew them
together to be used as a washer and hung to dry.
“I think it’s a good idea. I was really surprised, when we came
up with it we weren’t sure how it would pan out,” Olivia said.
She has sent emails to Orange Sky Laundry and Making a
Difference to see if her idea can be incorporated into the work
of these two initiatives that care for the disadvantaged in our
community.
Olivia’s mother Tracey Cognetta said many people were keen to
get involved.
“We were trying to help the homeless without a large cost fac-
tor,” Mrs Cognetta said.
“It is a bit scary actually, because it has become a big thing,
but we are very proud of Olivia and this is going to help a lot of
people.”
If you are able to donate socks Olivia suggests “the socks don’t
have to be a pair, they just need to be clean, have no holes, and
thin socks soap up better”.
To donate socks and help Olivia with her Genius Hour project
email
A mustard seed growing with Mercy
CONGREGATIONS of religious sisters have
been part of the fabric of Church life in Queens-
land since the early 1860s.
These religious women opened schools, hos-
pitals and hospices, orphanages and facilities to
employ women in need.
From small beginnings in the new colony of
Queensland, the sisters took to their work of
helping those who were poor and in need of care
with great faith in God.
While today many of the religious congrega-
tions are facing fewer numbers, their legacy
can be compared to the parable Jesus told of the
mustard seed, the smallest of seeds that produced
a great canopy to protect and nourish the birds in
its many branches.
Religious women and men have always em-
braced challenges.
Since the earliest days, they have sought crea-
tive, innovative ways not only to preserve, but
also to strengthen and ensure the future viability
of service to the sick, the uneducated, the needy,
the young, the elderly, the poor and marginal-
ised.
In more recent years congregation institutional
ministries have increasingly been led by lay
people committed to the mission of the Gospel
and spreading the reign of God.
Mercy Partners is a Catholic Church entity set
up with Holy See approval in November 2008
by the four Sisters of Mercy congregations in
Queensland to assume sponsorship responsibility
for their institutional ministries.
In more recent years the Presentation Sisters of
Queensland and the Missionary Franciscan Sisters
of the Immaculate Conception Australia have
transferred their education ministries to Mercy
Partners.
Mercy Partners has the capacity to sponsor in
the name of the Catholic Church any ministry
entrusted to it.
Through its canonical and civil governance
mechanisms Mercy Partners ensures that each of
its ministries acts in accordance with its mission
as a Church-sponsored ministry.
The mission of Mercy Partners “to contribute
to the emergence of a world where the heal-
ing, liberating and life-giving mercy of God is
experienced” is expressed in the active engage-
ment of many people in our ministries of health
care, education, and aged and community care
services.
Chair of Mercy Partners Council Dr Ray
Campbell speaks of the theological concept of
“communion” to describe Mercy Partners.
He said “communion” was a concept ex-
panded in the Second Vatican Council which
described the Church as a “communion”, the
supreme paradigm for communion being God,
three persons in one.
In his ecclesiology, St John Paul II favoured
the term “communion” and spoke regularly
of the inter-relation of communio and missio:
communion and mission.
Dr Campbell said that “when we speak of
Mercy Partners being a communion, I like
to refer to it as a ‘communion of charisms’”.
A charism is a gift of the Holy Spirit to the
Church.
For Mercy Partners, we have three distinct
charisms from the three religious congregations
who have transferred their ministries of educa-
tion, health, and aged care and community
services to Mercy Partners.
This, I think, gives Mercy Partners a richness
that supports ongoing collaboration across our
ministries as they continue to reach out to those
in need in our society.
Council deputy chair Mercy Sister Sandra
Lupi said “this idea of a communion of char-
isms inspires the ministry leaders to understand
their role within the Church as they continue
the work of the religious congregations who
were inspired by the Gospel message and their
founding charisms”.
“It also encourages further collaboration and
the building of positive relationships between
ministries,” she said.
Dr Campbell said, “From the collaborative
endeavours between aged-care communities
and schools and every relationship Mercy
Partners engages in, the focus is rooted in com-
munication, trust, sacrifice and mercy”.
“With time and attention each day for Christ,
we will grow stronger,” he said. “The religious
congregations ‘planted the seed’. How that
seed will continue to grow in each ministry is
unknown but ,with the continued care and nour-
ishment, every seed of faith will surely grow.”